believer;703022 wrote:I'll make ya all a deal. Keep your fingers off my SS contributions and I'll look the other way while NASA launches and crashes their taxpayer funded $424 million duds....or scuds.

Dear lord. This sounds like, "I won't pick on the financial sinkhole that you like if you don't pick on the financial sinkhole I like."

O-Trap;703063 wrote:Dear lord. This sounds like, "I won't pick on the financial sinkhole that you like if you don't pick on the financial sinkhole I like."

But the key difference is social security is not, in and of itself, wasteful or inefficient. It's an underfunded ponzi scheme, but I do agree that we need to eliminate waste and other inefficiencies before we basically expropriate more wealth from taxpayers (SS is basically $1 in, $1 out after administrative expenses).

And this thread really illustrates the problem. People don't want to touch NASA because it does add value and does provide a return, but that's simply the wrong approach/question. It's defeatist to say "$10M here, $400M there...it won't make a dent" and such a position is how you get a budget spiraling out of control because after filling a few thousand hands being held out it DOES add-up to be very significant. There has to be fiscal discipline across everything and all the way down. I do not support looking the other way or cutting too deep or cutting something meaningful because other far more wasteful/inefficient expenses are deemed too trivial.

gut;703558 wrote:But the key difference is social security is not, in and of itself, wasteful or inefficient. It's an underfunded ponzi scheme, but I do agree that we need to eliminate waste and other inefficiencies before we basically expropriate more wealth from taxpayers (SS is basically $1 in, $1 out after administrative expenses).

And this thread really illustrates the problem. People don't want to touch NASA because it does add value and does provide a return, but that's simply the wrong approach/question. It's defeatist to say "$10M here, $400M there...it won't make a dent" and such a position is how you get a budget spiraling out of control because after filling a few thousand hands being held out it DOES add-up to be very significant. There has to be fiscal discipline across everything and all the way down. I do not support looking the other way or cutting too deep or cutting something meaningful because other far more wasteful/inefficient expenses are deemed too trivial.

Oh I agree. I was speaking more to the way it was said.

A single nail cannot destroy a cinderblock. When many of them are fused together to form the head of a mallet, however, that changes.

O-Trap;703572 wrote:Oh I agree. I was speaking more to the way it was said.

A single nail cannot destroy a cinderblock. When many of them are fused together to form the head of a mallet, however, that changes.

I would challenge that one would! I bet if I pumped up the psi on my nail gun, I'd blow a cinder block to hell!

Bigred1995;703651 wrote:I would challenge that one would! I bet if I pumped up the psi on my nail gun, I'd blow a cinder block to hell!

Damnit, 95. Why'd you have to rain on my metaphor?

O-Trap;703665 wrote:Damnit, 95. Why'd you have to rain on my metaphor?

OK...Lets, us this one. "some times it take multiple flushes in order for a water saving toilet to work"

O-Trap;703063 wrote:Dear lord. This sounds like, "I won't pick on the financial sinkhole that you like if you don't pick on the financial sinkhole I like."

But my point is and has been all along that this country is broke. Perhaps NASA's budget is chump change in the overall budget and I will grant that some of the technologies developed by the space program are now benefiting the greater good, but the fact remains that even NASA should be subject to intense budget scrutiny as well as all federal spending programs.

I keep harping on the Social Security issue, but for good reason. If I had been free to route the $250,000 that has been confiscated by federal mandate from my labor over 40 years into my own choice of investments (IE: paying off my house, 401K, savings, whatever), none of the "we gotta cut entitlement" types would calling me a self-centered Boomer for expecting a return in full for my mandated "investment." Now the same people who label me a moron for attacking NASA's budget are generally the same folks who think I should sacrifice my quarter of a million dollars to payoff the national deficit caused by decades of Beltway incompetence and corruption including the fine people running NASA.

So when these folks splash a $425 million climate change rocket or have multiple orgasms at finding space spores while we're running trillion dollar deficits, you'll excuse me for thinking, "WTF?"

believer;703778 wrote:But my point is and has been all along that this country is broke. Perhaps NASA's budget is chump change in the overall budget and I will grant that some of the technologies developed by the space program are now benefiting the greater good, but the fact remains that even NASA should be subject to intense budget scrutiny as well as all federal spending programs.

I keep harping on the Social Security issue, but for good reason. If I had been free to route the $250,000 that has been confiscated by federal mandate from my labor over 40 years into my own choice of investments (IE: paying off my house, 401K, savings, whatever), none of the "we gotta cut entitlement" types would calling me a self-centered Boomer for expecting a return in full for my mandated "investment." Now the same people who label me a moron for attacking NASA's budget are generally the same folks who think I should sacrifice my quarter of a million dollars to payoff the national deficit caused by decades of Beltway incompetence and corruption including the fine people running NASA.

So when these folks splash a $425 million climate change rocket or have multiple orgasms at finding space spores while we're running trillion dollar deficits, you'll excuse me for thinking, "WTF?"

I'm not in disagreement about some of the thoughts on NASA. However, whether I'm being forced to contribute into a Social Security program through employment or being forced to contribute to NASA through taxation, waste is waste if it takes us further into debt.

O-Trap;703784 wrote:I'm not in disagreement about some of the thoughts on NASA. However, whether I'm being forced to contribute into a Social Security program through employment or being forced to contribute to NASA through taxation, waste is waste if it takes us further into debt.

agreed

What people need to get over with on the SS argument is that cutting the benefit isn't going to cut your taxes. We may very well have to start chipping away at it, but it absolutely should be about the last thing to go under the knife. Outside of admininstrative cost, it's pretty much $1 in and $1 out - there's no real ROI or waste associated with it. I refuse to support cutting the benefit 15-20% just so that money can be wasted creating $424M artificial reefs.

Well what is it then...."waste is waste" or you concede that NASA research provides benefits? You can't have it both ways. You can't concede that NASA research provides benefits and then say 'waste is waste'. Nor could you expect that funding something like NASA is going to be 100% without failure. That is sophomoric and naive. Moreover, forget the talking points and focus on what's really busting the budget. That is where you need to concentrate your efforts.
It's like some of you saying hey! "water is water" on the Titanic....everybody grab a bucket while ignoring the huge gash on the side of the ship.
NASA is not the problem...it has never been part of the problem...nor will it ever.
I've said it before and I mean it. Keep your eye on the ball.

HitsRus;704298 wrote:NASA is not the problem...it has never been part of the problem...nor will it ever.

What I'm saying (I assume you're talking to me, since you quoted me) is that it doesn't have to be all-or-nothing. Nor should it be.

Do I think that NASA should be cut back? Yes, as I think some of the studies there are not immediately necessary, particularly given the financial burden some of them carry. Moreover, when something which cost almost half a billion dollars does the world's biggest cannonball into the ocean, yes, that was a waste.

NASA is not the problem, but that doesn't mean NASA should have an impugn operating budget, either. If cutbacks are necessary (and I think we can all agree that they are), it may have to hold off on some of what those there want to do. I'm not saying do away with NASA. It is not a waste at all, in and of itself. However, in a time when we're in a fiscal mess like this, anything that isn't necessary is wasteful under the circumstances.

It's no different than the military in that respect. Is the military a waste? Of course not. However, does that mean that nothing should ever be trimmed or that budget cuts should not be made? Naturally, that's not the case, either.

Same applies.

I have no problem with trimming NASA's budget, or at the very minimum freezing it. I do not believe that is what believer originally meant, and I think he's backtracked significantly and is now riding the $425 million figure like Bachmann rode the $105 billion figure on Meet The Press (only hers is FAR more legitimate).

There are just numerous things you could cut before you even begin to look at NASA.

For starters, I'd legalize marijuana in a heartbeat and simultaneously cut the War on Drugs budget by 90%, and build the Mexican Wall with some of that money. It saves government money to treat drug abusers instead of throwing them in jail, so I'd do that instead. I'd lessen jail times for nonviolent crimes too. No one wins when you lock up druggies. I'd mandate drug testing for welfare recipients, and eliminate it for professionals.

I'd slash the highway funding immensely (with the Eisenhower sections being exempt). That $425 million "scud" is less than the cost of two interstate intersections. I'd make it a state issue. If the state wants to sprawl itself into bankruptcy, so be it. It is a fact that for some reason the federal government decided it wanted to pay for 90% of the cost of interstates. Ridiculous.

I'd increase the social security age from 65 to 67.

I'd enforce stricter requirements on disabilities.

Most of this shit: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2010/10/how-to-cut-343-billion-from-the-federal-budget

Some of this shit: http://blogs.reuters.com/james-pethokoukis/2010/11/15/balance-the-u-s-budget-it-did-it-in-under-a-minute/

....I'd fine Jim Tressel more too.

Damn, sounds like you're ready to take over!

I bet you can just taste those meaty leading man parts in your mouth, eh?

HitsRus;704298 wrote:Well what is it then...."waste is waste" or you concede that NASA research provides benefits? You can't have it both ways. You can't concede that NASA research provides benefits and then say 'waste is waste'. Nor could you expect that funding something like NASA is going to be 100% without failure.

Of course you can. You're not understanding how budgets are supposed to work. When there's too much fat, money is literally wasted and the far more troubling problem is BAD projects get ok'd. NASA is a great example, but it's rife in the federal govt. You trim budgets significantly and the ROI goes up because the shitty projects don't get funded.

Entitlements ARE NOT the problem, at least not nearly as much. SS, at least, is "self-funding"...that is, until the surplus got raided for your $424M NASA dud. Saying $10M here and $20M there isn't the problem and is trivial is a guaranteed failed approach. Hacking SS is only an interim solution and does not fix the problem because ultimately what is busting the budget is the $10M here and $20M there - multiplied thousands of times - that you don't feel is significant enough to move the needle.

NASA has @ $20B budget....Whether this rocket failed or not is really beside the point - I'm reasonably comfortable that this project and others didn't need to be pursued in the first place (without even asking the question of whether or not the private sector is already involved and/or has financial incentive to undertake such projects). Would we really losing anything cutting $2B from that budget??? $4B???

Slashing entitlements is not going to get you there, and it's also not going to solve the problem. You've got to cut the fat everywhere, and that includes NASA....or education...or whatever other federal program you want to defend

gut;704440 wrote:Entitlements ARE NOT the problem

Completely disagree. I don't disagree that NASA's budget can be trimmed in this time of budgetary crisis. But it's mere pennies, even when you add it all up it's not going to get the job done.

Look at Medicare and Medicaid. Trim the defense budget withe the same vigor you want to bring towards NASA (whose inventions have yielded billions in tax revenues) and direct it towards the Pentagon and you'll save the country's budget.

O-Trap;704425 wrote:Damn, sounds like you're ready to take over!

I bet you can just taste those meaty leading man parts in your mouth, eh?

[video=youtube;5posU08HjXg][/video]

Tobias Fünke;704451 wrote:Completely disagree. I don't disagree that NASA's budget can be trimmed in this time of budgetary crisis. But it's mere pennies, even when you add it all up it's not going to get the job done.

Look at Medicare and Medicaid. Trim the defense budget withe the same vigor you want to bring towards NASA (whose inventions have yielded billions in tax revenues) and direct it towards the Pentagon and you'll save the country's budget.

Entitlements do need to be trimmed, but part of that is because it was raided to fund budget overruns created by the same mentality some people seem to feel is too trivial to focus on. I simply refuse to endorse significant cuts in entitlements until they show REAL fiscal responsbility eslewhere, because when there's no more pennies left in the piggy bank then what? Raise my taxes? Take away my 401K deduction? Ba-bye to mortgage deductions?

That $1 I pay to SS is, theoretically, ear-marked for me at age 67 or whatever. So when you are proposing cuts to programs like SS you are, in fact, advocating a raise in taxes. Yes, higher taxes are inevitably part of the solution. But I refuse to endorse raising taxes until the economically illiterate fucktards in Washington show they have a clue. I'm not giving another dime to Washington until the dime I already gave that got split between reps of two different states where I don't live goes back into the pot.

Would we really losing anything cutting $2B from that budget??? $4B???

Hey, good luck with that fella. $100 billion/year in NEW healthcare entitlements, $150 billlion a year to maintain armies in Afghanistan and Iraq. New Medicare entitlements...all since taxes were cut in the Bush Administration.....and you want to go after NASA or any other minor contributor to the deficit. Go for it.... here's your bucket. I'm all for cutting waste at NASA, or anywhere else, but don't try to sell me that it's going to solve anything. Yammering at NASA is a distraction from what really needs to be done.....makes one feel good...like you are actually doing something. I've got no problem with current entitlements like Social Security. That actually a pretty easy fix once you get the other stuff handled.

HitsRus;704470 wrote:Hey, good luck with that fella. $100 billion/year in NEW healthcare entitlements, $150 billlion a year to maintain armies in Afghanistan and Iraq. New Medicare entitlements...all since taxes were cut in the Bush Administration.....and you want to go after NASA or any other minor contributor to the deficit. Go for it.... here's your bucket. I'm all for cutting waste at NASA, or anywhere else, but don't try to sell me that it's going to solve anything. Yammering at NASA is a distraction from what really needs to be done.....makes one feel good...like you are actually doing something. I've got no problem with current entitlements like Social Security. That actually a pretty easy fix once you get the other stuff handled.

Again, that's a complete failure of an approach. $2B here, $10M there, $100M over there....It all adds up. EVERYTHING has to be scrutinized. It's a mentality and cultural change that has to happen. Handing out $10M for worthless purposes like it's candy is how you end-up having to raid the SS trust and then suddenly you have a budget completely spiraling out of control. Saying $2B can't or shouldn't be cut from NASA is just flat ignorant. And ignoring it as trivial is foolishly irresponsible.

Cutting entitlements (some such cuts have much more merit than others) is a temporary fix AT BEST. It doesn't cure the disease.

I am not saying that you can't or shouldn't trim fat across the board, and that it doesn't add up...but it's triage. You have to stop the major bleeding first. Members of congress don't have time to scrutinize every line item, although that could be a goal for the future....but the fact of the matter is that we have spent 1.3 TRILLION the past 8 years in Iraq and Afghanistan, with no end in sight, and the President has prosposed new legislation that will cost $100 billion a year.

I'd rather more of my tax dollars go to NASA than welfare, department of education, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, foreign aid, obamacare, etc. etc. etc. etc. Out of everything the government spends money on, NASA is one of the very few who benefit this country and planet. Bitching over less than 1% of the federal government when we are wasting trillions in wars and health care/entitlements is just brain dead stupid.

From 1958 to 2008, NASA's total budget is $471.23 billion dollars for an average of a little over $9 B a year. $9 Billion a year average over 50 years and people are going to bitch when we spend more than 471 B in the Middle East in 6 months. Unfuckingbelievable. Now, think of all of the technological advancements this country has made in 50 years that we might not have without a space program and then get back to me about bitching about less than 1% fucking percent.

I've always wondered about the huge deficit that the US has.

Who or whom do we actually owe this money to?


By the way, good for the NASA scientist for finding something that may mean something to future endeavors.

gut;704467 wrote:That $1 I pay to SS is, theoretically, ear-marked for me at age 67 or whatever. So when you are proposing cuts to programs like SS you are, in fact, advocating a raise in taxes. Yes, higher taxes are inevitably part of the solution. But I refuse to endorse raising taxes until the economically illiterate fucktards in Washington show they have a clue. I'm not giving another dime to Washington until the dime I already gave that got split between reps of two different states where I don't live goes back into the pot.

This is precisely my point. EVERY program the Feds spend money on including the *COUGH* paltry $20 billion per year NASA is allotted is subject to scrutiny.

For those of you who harp on the daily billions we're blowing in Afghanistan and Iraq I wholeheartedly agree. It's time to tap into our sizeable domestic oil sources NOW and get the fuck out of there. I am friggin tired of dealing with the secular dictators and the radical Islamists.

We also need to withdraw from our pricey European bases. Bring the troops home, close unnecessary domestic bases, and post our troops on our southern border. Give them the authority to do what is necessary to stem the flow of illegal immigrants and get some real bang for our taxpayer buck.

Bringing home the troops would go a long, long way to balancing the federal budget. I'd rather see that happen before the Feds start reneging on the SS/Medicare "promise." Perhaps then my undies won't get as bunched up when we waste $425 million global warming rockets during trillion dollar deficits.